Epicor Software Corporation (NASDAQ: EPIC), a leading provider of integrated enterprise software solutions for the midmarket, today announced that Thomas Dudley Ltd, one of the UK's leading manufacturers of plastic toilet cisterns and foundry products has selected Epicor Vantage 8.0 to replace its ageing UNIX Tetra software. Vantage 8.0, the industrys first manufacturing solution based on a 100-percent service-oriented architecture (SOA) and optimized for high performance and collaboration across the globally expanding supply chain, outshined Microsoft Axapta and PeopleSoft EnterpriseOne over an extensive 3-month selection procedure following guidelines from the British Application Software Developers Association (BASDA).

This is a major decision for us as the choice of enterprise resource planning (ERP) and manufacturing software will affect our business immensely over the next decade, explains Simon Boyes, business systems manager for Thomas Dudley.

The process started in early 2004 when senior management at Thomas Dudley decided to replace its ageing Tetra CS3 system with a more modern non-UNIX application. The goal was to help streamline the business and provide a more powerful yet flexible ERP solution with a standard database and the ability to interconnect with other modern applications.

Boyes continued, We started with 12 possible vendors and we whittled it down to just three with which we then carried out a week long evaluation with representatives from each department, all based on a BASDA suggested evaluation template.

After the 3 weeks of in-depth evaluation, the decision from all the department heads was unanimously Vantage 8.0. The most common reason given was the sheer flexibility of the software combined with its easy to use management interface, Boyes adds.

The market position of the vendors was also a factor for us and the recent acquisition of PeopleSoft by Oracle was a concern, especially as its still not clear what the product strategy is, but thankfully we had already decided upon Vantage based on product functionality alone, Boyes concludes.

Vantage 8.0 features an n-tier architecture built with Microsoft .NET and Web services technology. Vantage is a complete end-to-end manufacturing system that addresses the core business needs of make-to-order (MTO) and mixed-mode manufacturers. The modular suite has built-in workflows managing the entire order cycle including Marketing, Sales, Production and Planning, Sourcing and Procurement, Installation and Service, through to Financial recognition.

Thomas Dudley has licensed almost the entire Vantage 8.0 module suite, with the first phase of migration and implementation scheduled to rollout to accounting, sales and purchase order processing in August. Manufacturing, customer relationship management (CRM) and supplier relationship management (SRM) are set for the end of the year, and the company also has plans to rollout a supplier Web portal in early 2006.

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